On 22 October 2020, the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Tourism and Sports assigned Dr. Panupak Pongatichat (Director of the Foreign Affairs Division) the Ministry’s representative to attend the 4th Meeting of the Sub-Committee on Trade and Economic Cooperation Thailand – Russia. The Deputy PM and Minister of Commerce co-chaired with the Minister of Economic Development of Russia to discuss ways to boost economic, trade and investment cooperation after the COVID-19 situation. One of the countries’ major goal is to increase the value of joint trade to 10 Billion US dollars by 2023. In this meeting, the Thai side has proposed a cooperation to restore Thai-Russian tourism, including more lenient travel restriction measures.
In 2019, almost as many as 1.5 million Russian tourists visited Thailand thus generating more than 100 billion Baht in income for the country. However, in 2020 as a result from COVID-19 pandemic, there are mere 590,000 Russian tourists visiting Thailand, generating approximately 39 billion Baht.
The joint efforts to restore tourism proposed by the Thai side could help restore tourism between the two countries. And when the situation relieves, it is expected that many Russian tourists will return to Thailand as usual. NB: the popular tourist destinations in Thailand among Russian tourists include Pattaya, Phuket, Krabi, Koh Samui, and Koh Chang.
